7/10

There’s an immediacy to Boy Grapes’ new record 'When I Close My Eyes' that feels like stepping into someone else’s current headspace; equal parts restless, chaotic, and strangely comforting. Across twelve tracks, the D.C. artist pulls us through shifting terrains, from acoustic daydreams to jagged punk blasts, metallic eruptions, and moments of fragile calm.

The record begins with 'Sand', a hushed piece that sets the stage like a false sense of security, before the mood unravels into sharp turns and restless energy. 'Just Move' delivers a burst of punk momentum, reckless and alive, while 'Muscular Atrophy' digs into a bass-heavy churn that feels both claustrophobic and hypnotic. Each track seems to dismantle what came before, refusing predictability in favour of raw instinct.

But what ties the album together is the vulnerability he looks to embrace. In 'What I See', Boy Grapes lets the volume surge into progressive heaviness, a clenched-fist anthem that feels like staring down your demons in a mirror. On the other end of the spectrum, 'It Isn’t Me' closes with stripped-down tenderness, a quiet exhale after all the storms.

Even the outliers, like the industrial-tinged 'Bobby' or the sprawling 'Better Time', feel necessary. They extend the album’s emotional range, proving Boy Grapes can swing between intimacy and intensity without losing the thread. Lyrically, themes of identity, inner conflict, and perseverance bleed through, but never in a way that feels preachy; it’s all lived-in, drawn from the fractures and flashes of personal experience.

'When I Close My Eyes' doesn’t aim for polish or cohesion in the conventional sense. Instead, it builds its power from unpredictability, and the way each track stands as a different lens on the same restless mind. It’s an album that demands you sit with its jagged edges, and in doing so, reveals an artist pushing himself to the brink and finding catharsis in the process.